2023 30thAnniversaryCommemorativeBook SINGLEPAGES-small - Flipbook - Page 66
ENSURING HOLOCAUST
EDUCATION
Both of our families
brought over people
trying to escape the
Holocaust in the 1930s.
I remember my father sponsoring
and getting people jobs. Bob’s
parents rescued many individuals.
Soon after we married, while having
dinner with Bob’s family, I met a
relative in her early 30s who said that
she would never get married because
she could never have children.
Bob’s mother, who was born in
Czechoslovakia, later explained that
this young woman had been a victim
of Nazi experimentation.
These and many other experiences
with survivors propelled us to get
involved with the US Holocaust
Memorial Museum, and they are why
we have committed to sustaining its
educational work through this legacy
gift. Young people need to know about
the Holocaust. They need to learn that
they can prevent it from
ever happening again. When I come
to the Museum, I like to follow behind
and observe the student groups.
They’re so respectful and so captivated
that it motivates me even more.
64 l UNITED STATES HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL MUSEUM LEGACY OF LIGHT GUARDIANS
We believe education—whether
getting more students to the
Museum or educational resources for
teachers to use in the classroom—is
so important. Holocaust education
should be available for every grade
level, starting with fifth grade. This
age is not too early to learn these
lessons. Not today, when kids are
exposed to so much on television
and in video games.
During one Days of Remembrance
ceremony, we vividly remember
watching a group of survivors while
soldiers marched in carrying flags
of the US armed forces’ liberating
divisions. We both focused on one
woman and welled up with tears
as her face lit up. I imagined her as
a young girl, seeing the liberators
arrive and hopeful that she might
get to see her parents again one day.
Thinking of what so many went
through during the Holocaust—we
just can’t let that happen again. We
want to ensure these lessons are
always taught. If our generation
doesn’t do this, who will?”